YouBot robots have learned to ask for help from people

As part of the new project, a team of specialists from MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) trained robots to ask for help from people. In this case, the robot first identifies its problem, and then asks the person to help. For the project, youbot robots were chosen, and they were modernized in such a way that these devices assemble furniture from IKEA. Of course, assembling furniture for a robot is not an easy task, and devices often have to stop, asking for human help.

There are a lot of reasons why a robot can request help. This is a highly located part that is needed for assembly, and some problems with the assembly itself. The project team was able to train robots to identify emerging issues so that, by requesting help, the robot could “tell” the person what was needed from him, the person.
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According to the authors of the project, youBot can now ask for one or another piece of furniture (of a certain color), or help to assemble some component. The most interesting thing is that requests are not made in the form of flashing LEDs, or there is a display message. Help is requested by voice. Among other things, robots are trained to identify even those problems that have not previously encountered, that is, the devices are self-learning.

Of course, the project itself is not fun. With it, developers are hoping to get a reliable problem identification system for robots that work in production. Stopping, such a robot will be able to inform the operator that the problem has arisen, identifying this problem with a high degree of reliability.



Via ieee.org